Opinion: Benedict and the Vatican Morass

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

... I ... welcome to Opinion Journal and Mary Kissel you're looking a live shot of the Vatican we had very surprising news today Pope Benedict ... announcing his resignation ... so what kind of church will bespoke leave behind ... Wonderland Columnist Dan Henninger and fellow Catholic joins me ... I tend to and from what is this Pope's greatest legacy was there a theme ... of his captaincy ... well I think it began when it was carnal Colonel Joseph Ratzinger and Ratzinger was a very powerful Awana ... apologist defender of the Catholic faith and of the Western tradition I'm it's a very ... very importantly the idea that ... we have a culture based on the reason rationality and moral structure ... and he did an excellent job of defining of them I think that's cool off as for defending it as well ... he also had a very tumultuous tenure and the child abuse cases for instance ... really marked ... Marquez administration how do you think he dealt ... with those cases ... I think you don't want them very well Marius matter fact offer ... as Cardinal he immerse themselves in the de tails of those cases and then after he became Pope ... he gradually adopted in the zero tolerance policy towards trial abuse ... and prosecuted a couple of very famous cases of father Mafia all in Mexico ... and a Legion of faith on the whim of sharply criticized ... we came to United States in two thousand and eight ... he met personally with the families of abuse to do would be different views themselves or their families ... from Boston ... and address that several times so ... in that respect I think they they they face up to it ... of publicly ... but administratively finding a structure ... with which we can deal with these cases has been much more difficult for the church he he also has a real challenge in reaching out to Catholics around the world that the opposition in the church is changing a lot ... aam honeydew for example with cassis in the Middle Eastern Catholics in China ... well ... it's good thing to bring up married because they had set up as an explicit goal in defending ... Liao are persecuted Christian minorities in the Middle East the Assyrians in Iraq the Coptic Christians in Egypt and now the Christians in Syria ... and ... it was a well intentioned goal but by and large those Christians are being driven out of those countries ... so the ... intention is not ... the intention is not really been matched by execution ... the fund to criticize this Pope and this Vatican Mary I think you would probably be that the bureaucracy of the Vatican ... is simply not suited to the twenty for Sentry world is virtually a sixteenth century bureaucracy ... and it often undermines the Pope's goals and good intentions it's not good at executing them and you'd ministrations ... this is of very serious problem for the Vatican on I think the Catholic Church generally even here in United States We thought about that the twenty first century I think we've got a shot of the Pops Twitter account at Ponte effects ... to weaken Klepierre on the screen ... I wanna come back to this bureaucracy and how it inhibits the church ... particularly with the child abuse cases to stand at the Calliope was my press back EU and say no ... he's such a good job why didn't they prosecute these priests earlier ... omniscient we see many more in these cases going into our justice system around and be handled internally by the church ... well I've The it up so that public authorities to take up the prosecution of the church itself is going to prosecute these cases ... bought off I think that that quietly Benedict himself was ... our didn't end to push hard against the trial the use cases ... and you know I have to push back a little bit against the public perception here because I think ... quietly they were doing a lot to try to bring ... these instances to the surface Benedict himself was the problem again what is the Vatican bureaucracy in the Catholic Church bureaucracy which moves so slowly if at all it undermined the Pope's ... expressed intention to bring these cases to the surface ... this is been in a significant problem for the Catholic Church ... the relationship with other states there was a big flap at the beginning ... of his tenure ... I'm talking about and that Muslims and violence I got a lot of pushback ... you think he was misunderstood or did he actually ... found this is the famous Regensburg lecture around me and I think that one was mis understood that one was so to my mind up early eloquent defense of reason and rationality rather than achieving one's Coulter ... um through blood as he put it and he was trying to push back against the idea that ... radical Islamic was not seem to be unable to integrate itself with the art traditions and structure ... of the West and that's what he was criticizing him for was trying to reach in dialogue with them ... again area relates to those ... strategies to defend Christians in the Middle East ... and Wall ... I thought he was eloquent in the way his state of these things it was the execution by the Vatican and the bureaucracy ... that and ultimately failed to carry for calm on the Pope's good intentions so could we see a Coke Timothy Dolan and any any pics and come out and I am to feed only great I think the younger they should try it for a younger Cardinal who's going to upgrade the manager real side of the Catholic Church because they just cannot afford an the twenty for Sentry to continue ... well with the bureaucracy that they've got which which fails the Pope appear rocker see frustrating executive sure sounds familiar here now Wonderland Columnist Dan Henninger thanks so much for being with us